The Kitchen Torch- Not Just for Creme Brulee

A few years ago, I bought a kitchen torch torch.  I was teaching foods at the time at Roosevelt Middle School in Glendale, California.  My students prepared lunches once a week for teachers to purchase and thus help finance groceries for our projects.  One of our lunches offered a dessert using a kitchen torch.  I brought mine from home and under careful supervision two advanced students made a cake with a meringue topping browned beautifully with the torch.  



When I first made the purchase it was called a Creme Brulee Torch- which seemed somewhat limiting.  Recently I found them in my local hardware store in Mammoth Lakes under the name kitchen torch.  Between that first experience at school and now, I have found many new uses.  

Creme Brulee is so popular today that it appears on almost every dessert menu of upscale restaurants.  Making your own is even more
rewarding.  




For my upcoming cookbook, I developed a recipe for S'Mores

S'mores Cupcakes

cupcakes.  The basic cupcake incorporated graham cracker crumbs.  When they first come out of the oven, each is topped with a piece from a Hershey milk chocolate bar.  Then they are topped with a cooked marshmallow frosting and browned with a kitchen torch.  

Easily started with my Kitchen Torch

Since I live in Mammoth, the winters require indoor heat.  I have a wood burning stove.  Building fires in it were a challenge for me at first.  We are asked not to use paper by our home owners group for safety reasons.  So even with fire starters (locally available) I still had to light them with matches.  This can be time consuming so at first I used my long nosed butane lighter I had in my former home in L.A.  Recently it occurred to me to use my kitchen torch.  It was so much easier to use than any of my previous tools.  Vive la kitchen torch!!!